


Here, Here, and Here

by renegade



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Community: makinghugospin, Deaf Character, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-19
Updated: 2013-07-19
Packaged: 2017-12-20 15:46:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/889029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renegade/pseuds/renegade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>taken from <a href="http://makinghugospin.livejournal.com/13488.html?thread=10412208#t10412208">this</a> prompt.</p><p>"I'd like a deaf Grantaire who's very good at reading lips, so he knows what Enjolras is talking about and he's in love with his words, his lips and everything but he never heard his Apollo's voice. Grantaire can talk a little bit, but he knows it sounds odd so he sticks to writing on post-it notes and putting them everywhere, even on people (Enjolras pretends he's annoyed by that but secretly collects them and puts them in a drawer at home)</p><p>then a doctor offers him the cochlear implant and maybe Eponine and a few of the Les Amis knows and he's gone for a while and then he comes back and hears Enjolras' voice for the first time and feels like crying and finally thinks Enjolras could love him now that he's closer to a normal person.</p><p>and maybe Enjolras was in love with him all along.</p><p>basically I want something that feels tragic but is the fluffiest thing that ever fluffied... well you know."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here, Here, and Here

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this at 4 am and cleaned it up a bit before posting. Was gonna add some stuff but decided I liked it the way it was. I don't know, I just really liked this prompt and I'm procrastinating writing other things I've been working on.
> 
> The tensing is weird, I know. I tried to keep it consistent @__@
> 
> Title comes from [Here, Here, and Here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eD8paLdgynk) by Meg & Dia. It doesn't have a whole lot to do with the story, but whatever.
> 
> Also, I only did some brief googling on cochlear implants and Ménière's disease so I apologize if I got anything wrong.

Grantaire's parents knew something was wrong with their son when he complained about his head hurting so much he couldn't see. Small children aren't supposed to get migraines, his parents thought. They gave him some children's Tylenol and tucked him into bed and kissed his forehead.

“Mommy and Daddy love you, Grantaire,” his mother had said.

Grantaire can still remember what his mother's voice sounds like. It had been sweet like honey and tea and made him feel safe. It was one of the only things that comforted him when he was a pre-teen and he was told his disease caused irreversible damage and he'd never hear again. They had tried every treatment available and, a few times, it went into remission and he tried to absorb as many sounds and words as possible.

But he spent more time in total silence. He learned to read lips quite well due to this, however, and the assholes in middle school who thought it would be funny to call him names because he couldn't hear were always surprised when they got Grantaire's fist in their face.

Grantaire changed schools a lot because of this, and his grades suffered. It was difficult to do most of his work when he couldn't hear the teacher, and sometimes, he wouldn't even let the class know he was disabled because he was so embarrassed.

High school was even worse. His parents got divorced and while Grantaire couldn't hear the fight, he could see it, and he could feel it. He could feel the vibrations under his feet and in the air of the shouting and the screaming and the stomping. He felt vaguely responsible for it. He almost wished he wasn't such a good lip-reader because he could see his father saying the words 'useless' and 'son' in the same sentence.

Grantaire is sure the only reason he even got into college because his disability explained his horrible performance. But he was skilled at art. He could paint and draw. He didn't need voices for it. Grantaire was a mute by choice, because he talked once, for a presentation, and one of the girls in his class had started laughing and told her friend he sounded stupid.

He wrote on the whiteboard, angrily, _I CAN READ LIPS_ and stormed out of class.

In college, though, people were more accepting. They didn't care that Grantaire couldn't hear. He was surprised how many students knew sign language, and even though it wasn't Grantaire's preferred method of communication, at least people were making an effort.

He found the ABC club through a posting on a bulletin board in the dorm lounge. On it, there was a picture of a boy with wavy blond hair and a red hoodie, and he was the most beautiful boy Grantaire had ever seen. He had to meet him and see him in the flesh.

“You want to go to a social justice meeting?” his roommate, had said when Grantaire excitedly waved the flyer at him after he got home from class. “I thought you didn't like that shit, R.”

 _When did I say that?_ he had written on his dry-erase board. _We should join_.

Bahorel had laughed and then agreed. They would go to a meeting and see what it was all about.

•

Since that day freshman year, Grantaire had been enamored with the fearless leader of the ABC. His obsession with the color red was rather frightening, but he spoke with conviction and his passion radiated off of him in waves. Grantaire clung to every word he said.

Enjolras didn't know, for the first few weeks, that Grantaire couldn't hear anything he said. He mostly just sat in the back and read Enjolras' beautiful red lips shaping all those idealist words. He made Grantaire want to believe that there was something good in the world. Not God, maybe, because Grantaire had stopped believing years ago. He had prayed and prayed that his disease wouldn't become permanent, and it did. He wasn't a bad kid. All he wanted to do was hear. Why would God do such a thing?

But he believed in Enjolras.

Enjolras found out he couldn't hear when Grantaire vocally disagreed with something he said. Even Grantaire can't keep his stupid mouth shut sometimes.

Enjolras had stopped, mid-sentence, and stared right at Grantaire. Grantaire had blushed bright red because he knows his voice sounds stupid. Sometimes, if he said easy words, he sounded normal, but most of the time it was very, very obvious he couldn't hear himself talk.

The next meeting, Enjolras had brought a sign language interpreter to stand next to him.

•

Grantaire found a new way to communicate, and even though he used his dry-erase board, he liked this method, too. He had an endless supply of post-it notes and he would write and draw things on each little square, leaving them for his friends to find. They had moved out of the dorms and into actual apartments, and Grantaire's meager disability checks helped pay rent. His friends were gracious enough to let him pitch in whatever he can instead of paying in full.

Sometimes, he put 'kick me' post-its on Enjolras' back, who had just rolled his eyes and took it off, but never crumpled it up. Grantaire always noticed the small smile on Apollo's face but he never mentioned it. He was afraid that if he did, he'd never see it again.

 _What does Enjolras' voice sound like?_ he wrote on a post-it to Courfeyrac.

“Consider yourself _lucky_ you don't have to hear it,” Courfeyrac had joked. Upon seeing the hurt look on Grantaire's face, Courfeyrac had ducked his head. “Sorry. Not the best time for humor. I don't know how to describe his voice.”

Grantaire tried to imagine it. It was probably sharp and scalding like a cup of fresh coffee. But it could be soft and sweet and warm, like hot chocolate. Enjolras would talk to Grantaire sometimes, one on one, and he also made a valiant effort to learn sign language even though Grantaire insisted that he was good at reading lips.

It still pained Grantaire every day that he would never hear Enjolras' voice. People liked it. People believed in him. His words, of course, were beautiful, and so was everything else, but the one thing Grantaire wanted most in the world was to hear that beautiful boy's voice. He would give up almost anything to have a conversation with him and not have to read his lips.

•

He got chosen to do a medical trial for Ménière's disease patients and cochlear implants. Grantaire had been hesitant at first, because he didn't want to be let down again. He had been told he would recover from the disease, that he would regain at least partial hearing, but he'd spent most of his life in complete silence.

Eponine convinced him to go through with it. If it didn't work, then he wasn't losing anything, but if it did, he could finally hear Enjolras' voice. Grantaire desperately wanted to hear it, just once, so he agreed to go through with the surgery.

When he woke up in his hospital room, there were balloons and flowers from the few club members he had told about his plans. Grantaire couldn't hear anything, and he didn't know if he was supposed to, but he still cried because the thought of it not working was too much to bear. But he still had weeks to go for his recovery and speech therapy. The device was clunky on his ear and Grantaire wanted to pull it off, but it may have been his only shot at hearing Enjolras speak.

He went to a club meeting after missing weeks and weeks of them. Enjolras, to Grantaire's surprise, looked happy to see him.

“Where have you been? I missed you,” he said.

Grantaire's breath caught in his throat and he brought a hand up to turn his device on. “Say that again,” he said. His own voice still sounded foreign to his ears.

“I missed you,” Enjolras said again, confused.

Grantaire covered his mouth with his hands and the tears started flowing freely. “I can hear you,” he said through sobs. Enjolras looked alarmed and pulled him in for a hug, shushing him. “I can hear you,” Grantaire mumbled, clutching onto the back of Enjolras' shirt.

•

“Don't turn that off when you don't want to listen,” Enjolras says. “Especially since I know you can read lips regardless.”

Grantaire sticks his tongue out at Enjolras but flicks his hearing aid back on. Sure, Enjolras' voice sounds quiet even though he's speaking at normal level, but Grantaire really doesn't care. He doesn't care that it doesn't work in the noisy setting of the Musain. He can hear Enjolras' voice when they're quiet in bed together and it's just them and that's all that matters.

Enjolras kisses Grantaire softly. “I love you,” he says. Grantaire will be happy if that's the last thing he ever hears.


End file.
